convenience
by not a straight trumpet
Summary: Kumiko and Reina spend some time together on the way home from school.


**a/n:** what is happening

you know you've been writing a pairing for a while when them doing errands becomes fun and exciting

* * *

It was nights like these, stopping by the convenience store on the way home from school, that Kumiko felt humbled - _was that the right word?_ \- by how lucky she was, walking in time with Reina while orange hues lit up the buildings around them.

 _Grateful,_ she thought a moment later, _it was grateful._

"Alright, I need toothpaste and a hat for when the summer starts, and you need batteries and another hat for when the summer starts." Reina held a scrap of notebook paper diligently in her hand as if it were the most crucial of documents, stepping inside the harsh white light of the store.

"For when the water flies start coming from everywhere," Kumiko amended. "Ugh, I hate them."

"Who doesn't?"

"They're j-just so . . . loud, and they get on your skin and buzz all around." Kumiko shuddered at the very thought. "I know everything's got a place in the system of things, but every water fly could drop dead and I'd be happy as anything."

"Most of the planet would agree with you on that sentiment, I think." Reina ran her hand along a series of greeting cards, arranged alphabetically so that _Sorry For Your Loss_ was right next to _Seventeenth Birthday._ Kumiko thought this was very morbid. Reina caught her sleeve's button on the ribbons on one and shook it away. "The hats are right down the next aisle, I think."

"Reina Kousaka in a big floppy hat." Kumiko giggled at the thought. "I can't even imagine it."

"You won't have to, in a minute," Reina said, interlocking Kumiko's fingers with her own. The sleeves on the winter uniforms were long, but it was still easy enough for the two of them to hold hands. In any case, "winter" wasn't really the most accurate statement. It was May, with June fast approaching and with it the dreaded water flies. Both Kumiko and Reina thought it best to prepare as much as they could.

"I can't wait," Kumiko snorted, and she thought she must be turning into an old lady to be this excited about shopping. Not even interesting shopping, either - shopping at a convenience store on the way back from school for essentials. _Essentials._ Soon enough she'd be euphoric over toilet paper.

"There we go," Reina said, reaching a rack of hats and placing one on her head. Kumiko adjusted it so it tilted jauntily to the side, then found one herself. Both of them were laughing and laughing by the time they reached the checkout counter, and it was all so mundane and yet Kumiko couldn't help but feel such warmth in her chest that she thought it might explode. She wouldn't mind that, really. Extraordinary or ordinary as their day-to-day adventures might be, Kumiko Oumae was deep, deep in love, and so was Reina.

So was Reina, and that made everything beautiful.

"We're like honeymooners," Kumiko mused as the two of them stepped outside. Buds on the trees were starting to blossom into full-grown leaves. The summer was coming, they both knew it. Reina's expression was harder to read with the hat still covering part of her face in shadow. The rest of their purchases sat in a thin plastic back swinging at Kumiko's side.

"What do you mean?" A flock of birds seemed to notice the pair walking towards them and took flight, flapping their wings until Kumiko couldn't see them at all.

"Everything's j-just . . . heightened. I can't believe I'm with you. Here. Together."

"I feel the same way." It was still hard to make out, but Kumiko wondered if Reina was blushing under the hat.

"It's like, I want to go out to the bridge and yell to everyone, 'I love my girlfriend!' We should be able to do that."

"There's nothing stopping you," Reina pointed out.

"I guess not." Kumiko paused. "We could make a day out of it. Play some music and run out there one night and just yell and yell and yell. No more good-girl skins or masks or anything. Just all of our feelings, poured out there." They reached a crosswalk, the blinking red _STOP_ turning to a green person just seconds later. "That'd be nice."

"It sounds like one of my plans."

"Maybe you're rubbing off on me, _Kou-sa-ka-san."_ Kumiko enunciated each syllable of the honorific like a robot. Reina elbowed her, laughing. The hat nearly fell off.

"Perhaps I am, _Ou-mae-san."_ The city lights made it hard to see the real stars, Kumiko idly thought as they approached the train station. Uji was nothing gigantic, no massive metropolis of skyscrapers, but it was bright.

She didn't mind that so much, though. It meant she got to see Reina better, and cheesy as it sounded she'd much prefer that to some balls of fire millions of miles away, and so she was grateful.

* * *

 **a/n:** it's been at least two hours since i said how much i love kumirei so. i love kumirei!


End file.
